SAN FRANCISCO - One student was killed and four others injured on Wednesday in a shooting at a high school near Spokane in the northwestern US state of Washington.

The shooting took place shortly after 10:00 am local time at Freeman High School in Rockford, Spokane County, in Eastern Washington state.

More than an hour later, Spokane County Sheriff's Office updated its posting on Twitter social network, announcing that "Freeman School NOT an active scene - 1 person detained."

"The shooter is in the back seat of a patrol car right now," Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich was quoted as saying earlier by the Spokesman-Review, a daily broadsheet newspaper based in Spokane county.

However, while the newspaper reported that the shooter is a student at the school with more than 20 staff members and 300 students, authorities have withheld the identity of the suspect as well as those killed and injured.

At Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center and Children's Hospital in Spokane, a spokeswoman said the three patients are in stable condition.

Governor of Washington state Jay Inslee expressed his condolences on Twitter: "This morning's shooting at Freeman High School is heartbreaking. All Washingtonians are thinking of the victims and their families."

It is not clear whether Freeman High School will open Thursday. Nobody answered the phone with a record asking the caller to leave a message during normal office hours Wednesday afternoon.